The Best
by GreenFire1
Summary: Kaiba finally achieves his ultimate goal...now what? warshipping fic


Title: The Best

Author: GreenFire

Rating: PG

Pairings: Kaiba/Amelda

Description: Kaiba has finally achieved his greatest goal…now what?

Authors notes: This came out of a conversation of how Kaiba would react if he ever actually beat Yugi in a duel. Yes it is shonen ai, but that takes a backsteet in the plot.

Edit: I had this up before using the name Alastair, after having numerous people telling me I misspelled it and getting annoyed, I changed it to his real name. So there.

_236…237…38, 39…240…_

_Knock knock_

_245… 246…_

_Knock_ "Seto? Are you in here?"

"Hn" _248…_

Amelda pushed the door open, recognizing Kaiba's customary greeting. Though it was the middle of the day the room was dimly lit. The curtains had been drawn, blocking out almost all the sun. The only real light in the room came from the open laptop on the nightstand, facing the bed. Oddly for this time of day, the young ceo wasn't at the laptop; the repetitive screensaver suggested that he hadn't been for some time. Instead of working the young man was laying on his bed, still neatly made as though it hadn't been used the night before. Kaiba showed none of the rigidity usual to his demeanor. Instead he lay with his arms and legs spread out limply, staring intently at the ceiling with a bored look on his face. Concerned by the odd scene before him Amelda slowly closed the door and made his way over to the bed.

"Seto, did you finish working already?" he asked knowing it was absurd as usually the ceo worked nonstop and it took the combined efforts of his lover and brother to get him to break for food and occasional sleep.

"nn…" Kaiba replied without breaking his concentration from the ceiling.

Getting even more worried by his lover's lack of response, Amelda slowly crawled up on the bed next to Seto. He laid down close enough that the top of his head touched Kaiba's cheek and he wrapped his right arm around Kaiba's chest in a gentle hug.

"What are you looking at so hard? Did the ceiling insult you?" he asked in his normal mocking tone.

Kaiba gave an annoyed grunt and stated irritably, "For your information, I just noticed the ceiling tiles are imperfect. They have black dots all over them." Their position made it impossible for Kaiba to see his lover's expression, but he knew the redhead was making a face at him, and he defiantly felt Amelda's shoulder's shake in silent laughter.

"What?" Kaiba snapped. "They do. There's over 314 in this section alone."

"314? That's an exact number."

"Over 321 now."

"…Are you counting?"

Silence greeted his question.

"You mean to tell me that Mr. Seto Kaiba, youngest ceo of the largest military"

"Gaming" Kaiba responded absently.

"Gaming corporation who survives solely on caffeine and the glow from a laptop is taking a break from work to count black dots on the ceiling?"

Kaiba didn't respond, but he also didn't move away irritably. In fact, he didn't move at all. He continued to stare up at the ceiling but his eyes became less focused and as slack as the rest of him. Amelda sat with him, hugging him closer in the tense silence. As the minutes rolled by Amelda became more and more uncomfortable and tried to find a way to distract himself.

"Hey!" He exclaimed suddenly, causing Kaiba to jump slightly. "A bunny"

"A what?" Kaiba asked tersely, finally moving to stare at his lover, demanding an explanation for the stupid comment.

"A bunny, see?" Amelda said ignoring the look he was getting. He traced a design with his finger in the air. "If you connect those black dots in the middle there it looks like a bunny. He's even got a carrot see?" he traced another design slightly to the right of his first one.

"You're an idiot"

"You can't see it?"

"I refuse to be in a conversation about imaginary pictures in imperfections in the ceiling."

Amelda gave a snort, "Says the guy who was counting them."

"I don't have to explain myself to you." He paused, starting to turn on his side. "It's obviously a dragon," he muttered turning fully away from Amelda to lay on his stomach, in the same spread out position but with his gaze now on the laptop's screensaver.

"Oh yeah? Then what's the carrot?"

"If you can't say something intelligent, shut up."

Amelda would have laughed at the Kaiba's banter, but his odd composure had him worried. The redhead turned on his side and placed his hands on Seto's shoulders bringing himself in closer but keeping most of his weight on the bed. He rested his head lightly on Kaiba's hair with his mouth close to the ceo's ear.

"What's wrong?" he asked softly. "And don't give me that nothing bullshit."

He was again answered by silence.

"I know something is wrong. Everyone knows something is wrong. I came up here against your 'leave me the hell alone I'm working' request because your secretary called saying she hadn't gotten any orders from you in three days. Then I come up here and it looks like you haven't been working at all. What's going on? Starting to trust that your underlings won't ruin the company if you aren't in charge of every decision?"

Amelda was only able to pick up the words "idiots" and "work" out of the mumbled reply.

"And I know that you not eating is normal when you're working, but Mokuba said he hasn't seen you at a meal in a week. You're starting to scare your little brother."

Kaiba moved to hide more of his face in the sheets. "I have been working," he said, pointedly ignoring any of the other criticisms.

"Have you?" Amelda asked, not believing him. He reached over and bumped the laptop enough to remove the screensaver. He jumped a bit when he saw the design specs on the screen, grabbing the laptop and placing it on Kaiba's back. He scrolled down over the new duel disk designs, his face getting angrier the more he saw. "Kaiba! You have less here than you did a week ago. What the hell have you been doing?"

Abruptly sitting up with an annoyed growl, Kaiba grabbed the laptop and scrolled through the code. "There," he said, stopping on one set. "I've been working on a way to make the holographic processor smaller by routing it through the C and D matrices so it'll fit into a smaller system. Now, leave me alone!"

Amelda instead leaned in closer, wrapping his arms around Kaiba and resting his head on his shoulder to better see the screen. "Oh, but if you do that you'll leave a big backdoor open here and here for anyone to stick a virus," he said pointing at the computer screen. Kaiba hit his hand away so he couldn't smudge the screen.

"I said I'm still working on it."

"Why would you need it that small?" Amelda said as though he hadn't heard Kaiba. "You gonna fit it into a wrist watch or something?"

"Yes. Eventually I could do that."

"What? Why would you want to? How could you fit the cards into something that small?" he challenged.

"I'll put everything on the internet. You won't need cards anymore, everything will be virtual. I'll hold the entire monopoly, and if Pegasus complains I'll just buy him out."

Amelda checked his lover's face to see if he was being serious, and was very relieved to see his annoyed expression lightened by a playful smirk. The red head was happy that he was acting normal and decided to tease him further.

"But if all the cards are available to anyone that'll make rare cards worthless, including your precious dragons. Now that'd be funny. You getting beaten by some ten year old with a deck full of blue eyes."

"That'll never happen," Kaiba said matter of factly.

"Oh? How are you going to prevent it?"

"Easily. I'll be in charge of the virtual card store and no one will ever have a Blue Eyes White Dragon but me!" Kaiba said in his normal possessive tone.

Amelda squeezed Seto lightly and softly laughed to himself, partly out of relief that his lover seemed to be feeling better and partly because of how ridiculous he was. Not wanting the ever-serious ceo to know he was being laughed at, Amelda returned his attention to the computer screen. As he looked at closer at all the changes that had been made in the code his worry returned.

"Seto…"

"What is it now?" he asked irritably.

"All of this new code would have taken you a day to write at most." Thinking his partner was back to normal, he decided it would be safe to tease him. "Have you been distracted?" he asked running his hand up Kaiba's chest, "or are you just losing your touch?"

He realized late that teasing was a mistake, as Kaiba's face again took on the expressionless quality it had earlier. He slowly set the laptop back on the nightstand and lay down on his back staring straight up.

"Seto…what's"

"I don't know." It was said softly, almost not Kaiba's voice. "It doesn't seem important. Why should I build a new duel disk…people are still buying the old one."

Trying to encourage his lover, Amelda replied, "well…but what about when everyone has one? You need something new to get people to spend all their money on. Don't want to go bankrupt."

"Like you'd care if Kaiba Corp went under….besides someone else will just start making them. You and your stupid friends already showed that was possible."

Kaiba sounded so indifferent, it wasn't like him. Amelda racked his brains thinking of things that normal Kaiba liked to cheer him up, or piss him off, anything to get a reaction. _Duel Monsters? Mokuba? Power? Me?_

"It just doesn't matter…I don't care, let someone else take over the Duel Monster's franchise. I'm tired of paying Pegasus royalties anyway."

"What?" Amelda exclaimed, actually shocked.

"I've grown out of it. Don't look at me like that. I was into dueling for years. What? I can't find a new hobby?"

"No!"

His outburst finally got a reaction out of Kaiba. He looked sharply at Amelda with an expression of pure disbelief. "What did you say?"

"I said 'no'… you can't just give your entire life up like that."

"That stupid game is hardly my entire life," he said indifferently.

"Oh really?" Amelda said, removing himself from the bed. Kaiba's off-hand dismissal of the thing that had driven his life for more years than he could remember had frightened and confused Amelda. Unable to deal with these emotions because of his lover, he turned to the normal emotion between them; anger. Amelda hoped to show him just how foolish he was being.

He walked quickly to the opposite wall and flipped on the light, causing Kaiba to shield his eyes and give a groan as he sat up. He then angrily walked to one of the adjacent walls that, like the others, were littered with trophies.

"You don't care anymore?" He picked up one of the trophies with a date marked over ten years prior. "You spent over a decade playing this game! Winning everything you could, because you could…and now you don't care anymore." He threw the trophy carelessly, causing it to topple over several others and Kaiba to wince. "How many do you suppose you have here? 1, 2…" He pointed to each one as he counted, "5…well what's the point in counting them you don't care anymore?" and promptly kicked them over, the domino effect taking down more, while the ceo looked at him with horror and anger.

Deciding he was done with the trophies, Amelda made his way over to the corner where Kaiba had his duel disk prototypes displayed. Kaiba raised a finger and glared at his lover, silently daring him to even think about throwing those. Amelda was mad but not insane, and settled for merely pointing as he continued his rant.

"You turned an entire company into a machine for making props for the 'stupid game'. You've spent days without sleep writing code and building these things just so you can play that 'stupid game'. You mean to tell me that Mr. Time Is Money Can't Rest For Anything ceo has spent the last who knows how much of his life wasting his time building toys for some hobby that's so stupid he can grow out of it in a night."

"Who said it was in a night?" Kaiba asked, he tried to be angry but had some foreign emotion playing across his face. "How do you know I haven't been thinking about this for awhile?"

Amelda fixed Kaiba with a steady glare. "Because I listen to you, it's damn hard not to. You haven't shut up about your new duel disks for the past three months. You argued with the head of the national tournaments for most of last year because they put a restriction on one of your cards. You haven't talked about anything besides your newest tournament to Mokuba and me for the past 2 weeks. Then it happens and all of a sudden you disappear into your room. You haven't even told us how it went yet."

At the mention of a tournament, Kaiba suddenly found the floor very interesting and refused to look away. This move wasn't lost on Amelda, as things began to click in his mind. He hadn't been able to see the end of the tournament, since one of his old hacking buddies was looking for him there. They hadn't left on the best of terms, so Amelda had given up watching Kaiba in the finals to avoid old debts being called up.

"How was the tournament Seto?"

Silence.

"How far did you get?"

"Drop it"

"Who won?"

"Doesn't matter"

"Did Yugi win?"

"….no."

"Someone beat Yugi? Why haven't I heard about that? News of someone beating the 'King of Games' would have traveled through the gaming circuit in an instant. He did compete right?"

"Yes he competed, and why do we have to talk about him?" His curt voice took on the edge it always did when talking about his rival.

"Who won?"

"If I tell you will you shut up?"

"Fine"

With a defeated sigh, Kaiba returned his gaze from the wall to the red head and stated simply," Me."

That answer took Amelda by surprise. Kaiba had just won a tournament, not only that had beaten his ultimate rival, and wasn't gloating? Kaiba always gloated during duels while he toyed with his opponent; it was part of the fun of the game. He always laughed especially when winning against Yugi, until the match turned around and he lost. Kaiba should have come home beyond happy, telling Mokuba and him all about it like he did every time he took down an adversary at the business. He should have celebrated. He should have done something besides hide in a dark room counting spots on the ceiling and ignoring everything. Calmed from his anger, Amelda sat down next to Kaiba and leaned his head on his shoulder.

"Why didn't you tell me you'd won?" he asked softly. "We could have celebrated."

"Because." Seto said in a choked voice. He opened and closed his mouth as though he had more to say, but nothing came out. He closed his eyes and took a silent moment to compose himself. He still refused to look at Amelda, gaze firmly on the wall, but he finally said, "because…it…doesn't matter."

"What? How can it not matter?" Amelda asked genuinely confused.

"Because it doesn't."

"What do you mean? You finally beat him. You wanted to be the best and now you are"

"No."

"Yes you are…"

"No," he said more forcibly.

Deciding his lover was just being childish Amelda tried to keep giving the same encouragement. "Yes, now you're the best."

"NO." Kaiba jumped off the bed and turned to face his off balanced partner, before Amelda even knew he'd moved. "I'm not the best. I WAS the best!" Kaiba was shouting now, every bit of energy left in his drained formed being put into his words. Amelda, nervous by the sudden change in his demeanor, sat surprised but silent.

"I was the best," Kaiba began again, softer but still forcibly. "I was the master of every game. I had every high score. Even if I had to cheat I made sure I was the best. Everyone knew it. And now…"

Amelda followed Kaiba with his eyes, as he crossed the room to the laptop. He closed the application with the duel disk design, showing behind it an online gamers forum. Kaiba walked away in disgust and started pacing the room, alternating between seething, being composed and then trying to pull out his hair, occasionally a scream behind a closed mouth was heard. Unable to watch that for more than a moment, Amelda distracted himself with the forum. Kaiba had left it open on a thread about the previous tournament. There was nothing special about it, people chatting about the new monsters they'd seen, and who'd won. It wasn't a very intelligent conversation but he could see nothing offensive or that would make Seto loose his composure like this.

He moved from the laptop back to the edge of the bed, never taking his eyes off Seto's still pacing form. He opened his mouth and started to call Kaiba's attention, but then thought better of it and remained silent. After another few moments, Kaiba finally stopped pacing and turned to face his lover. The pain was evident on his face; it was a look of complete self loathing and anger. He tried to talk again, but it turned into a shuddered breath. Taking another moment to compose himself, he began again.

"When Yugi beat me, everyone called him the best. You couldn't go anywhere in the gaming community without hearing 'someone finally beat Kaiba' and being awed every time they heard Yugi's name. A few of the dumber ones even thought they could bring it up to my face, but most of it I got from forums like that stupid thing." He pointed at the laptop with a shaking finger. "I was a laughing stock. I vowed that I would beat him, get my title back and make all of the little shits who thought they could insult me regret it.

"Now I've finally done that. I beat him, but…"his sentence broke off in another shuddering breath. "Now that I've beaten him no one is saying 'someone finally beat Yugi' or saying anything about me regaining my place as the best again. No…the insults have stopped but, now they cheer for both of us. They envy the skill and power of both of us."

Kaiba had begun walking again while talking and had slowly made his way to the bed. He sat down heavily, causing Amelda to bounce a bit. Kaiba turned to face him with the same look he'd had while staring at the ceiling.

"That's what I've come to realize," he began again. "That's what I've been thinking about constantly trying to understand….I can never be the best again. I lost that title the second Yugi got the final piece of Exodia. The highest I can be is one of the greats, but the Best is forever gone.

"I thought I could get it back if I could just beat him. I threw tournament after tournament, spent all of my time and even put my entire company into making new Duel Monsters technology, just so I could beat him...but more than that just so I could regain my title."

Kaiba stopped speaking and dropped his head on a very scared Amelda's shoulder. He had never seen the lover like this. He'd been with him for years, but hadn't heard as much about the inner workings of Kaiba's mind as much as he had in the past few minutes. He was seriously worried about his partner's wellbeing, but wasn't sure whether allowing him to continue or stopping him would be worse. He felt Kaiba's shoulders shake periodically, it was as close to crying as he'd ever seen the man get.

The silence was broken by Kaiba's voice, softer now as if talking more to himself than the one whose shoulder he was resting on. "Nothing I ever did was good enough. I wasn't good enough to get us out of the orphanage. I couldn't make anyone see why they should take Mokuba too, I was a horrible brother. I wasn't good enough to beat Gozoburo so I cheated, and I've cheated in the same way many times over for worse reasons. Teachers praised my abilities but no matter how hard I studied it was never hard enough."

His voice had taken on a monotonous tone, and he continued, "The only thing I was good enough at was Duel Monsters. I didn't have to cheat to win any match, I just knew how to use the cards right to do it. I was finally good enough at something….no I was the best at it. But that's gone. It's been gone for years and I was too stupid to see it!

"I've wasted so much of my time…so much energy working for a lost cause. I've wasted years on a lost cause. Who knows what I could have been doing instead….I could have kept my promise to my brother and built his amusement park…I could have…I don't even know. Even right now all I can think about is that stupid game and I don't even want to anymore. I've spent so long on this one goal I don't know what to do anymore. I've wasted everything on my obsession and..."

Kaiba started to trail off. His voice had gotten fainter as he progressed and it seemed he just didn't have the will to continue. Amelda had no idea what to do anymore. This was so different to how his lover usually acted he didn't know how to react. The playful banter and teasing their relationship thrived on wouldn't work anymore, and Amelda tried desperately to think of something that would make Kaiba stop thinking like this. He tried to say something many times, but he could never make it past the first word before dismissing his idea.

After a time, Kaiba broke his eye lock with the wall, broke off from Amelda 's shoulder and leaned back on the bed without a word. Amelda looked down at the deceptively peaceful boy as he curled up on his side, his breaths becoming regular. Deciding to let him rest, he moved silently to flip off the lights, and close the laptop. He looked once more at the sleeping ceo and turned to leave.

He was half way to the door when he thought better of it. Carefully so as not to rouse Kaiba, he slipped onto the bed in front of him and slowly wrapped his arms around Kaiba's middle. The sleeping ceo gave a small grunt and moved his arms to surround the body in front of him. Amelda looked at the face in front of him; even in sleep it had never been so unguarded. Unable to stand it for long, Amelda hugged Kaiba tighter to him, and started to drift off for a nap himself.

"We just need to find you a new goal."


End file.
